Originally posted by Sin I AM What tier is he in ON AVERAGE based on FEATS? Not writer/editor/fanfic/handbook statements...stuff that actually happened in comics.
I'll answer that question for you, but I hope you don't mind reading a lot:
On battle boards we always go with the most recent version of a character. And when it comes to the Sentry many readers make the mistake of not doing so. They look at stuff that has happened in the past, even though it doesn't matter anymore.
The Sentry had changed after his encounter with the Molecule Man. During that fight he went: "I have this" and then he did the impossible. He beat the Molecule Man at his own game. And that Molecule Man ripped him apart before. But Sentry reconstructed himself and defeated him. At that moment the Sentry had become truly invincible.
The weakest the Sentry has ever been in the comics was during his fight against World War Hulk. Let's just assume that Incredible Hulk is a high herald strength and durability wise, when he is angry. And during World War Hulk he was far more angry. Is it crazy to assume that WW Hulk was a low trans, or maybe even a mid trans level character at that point? At least strength and durability wise.
And the Sentry at his absolutely lowest in terms of power fought that Hulk to a standstill. No one was holding back during that encounter. All of it is well documented.
So you have Sentry at his weakest fighting off a low to mid trans level character. And that was prior to his "power upgrade", which he received during the Molecule Man fight, where he had figured it all out.
Speaking of the Molecule Man fight. During that fight the Sentry was not as unstable as he was during the WW Hulk arc. And with the Sentry he becomes overall more powerful the more mentally stable he is. It's like with Superman being near Kryptonite. The closer he is, the weaker he becomes.
So Sentry during the Dark Avengers storyline was above a low to mid trans level character. And the Molecule Man ripped someone like that apart like he was nothing. The Molecule Man also transformed the Adamantium in Bullseyes spine into water. So Molecule Man as well was easily above a low to mid trans level character at that point. Since they are usually not capable of destroying +high herald level opponents like that. Thanos has molecule manipulation to an extent and he wouldn't be able to destroy Thor on a molecular level. The Dark Avengers Molecule Man would have done that with a thought.
(And all of that even if we assume that Sentry's durability is below the one of trans level characters. His durability was always kinda questionable and he made a lot of it up with his healing factor. But it still easily at high herald levels, if not above.)
I believe, that a mentally stable Sentry is the absolutely most powerful high trans level character in comics. There is no one, who comes even close to him in that tier. Not even Thanos.
Sentry has the upper hand, because he is so ridiculously versatile. He has all those hax abilities and is immortal. If you want to beat the Sentry, then you need to have a ton of hax abilities as well. And that above the Sentry's level.
Now the question would be if the Sentry approaches skyfather levels. I don't think that he does, judging by the feats alone. Skyfathers have done more impressive stuff than the Sentry has.
Odin alone has not only made the entire Earth civilization forget something, but he has also transported them all from one planet to another. With his magic alone. And on top of that Odin's Asgardian Magic is probably not far below the power of the Norn Stones, which have caused the Sentry harm in the past. We also had Asgardian Magic enchanting an axe to a point, where it was capable of killing Celestials. If Odin wants Sentry dead, Sentry would die. So I don't think that Sentry approaches high skyfather levels. However I do think that he would put up a better fight than Thanos did against Odin.
Originally posted by Sin I AM And how well does he do against
Nu Darkseid
Classic Thanos
Classic Fate & Classic Strange with 30 min prep.
Classic Odin
New 52 Darkseid:
I haven't read the Darkseid War storyline, but from the early New 52 comics with Darkseid in them, Darkseid has done nothing to a point, where I could see him beat the Sentry. I think that the post Dark Avengers Sentry would have destroyed the entire Justice League, which Darkseid has faced far quicker.
Classic Thanos:
Who is classic Thanos? The one prior to Death upgrades? If so, why would you put a weaker Thanos against Sentry? Do you expect the more recent versions of Thanos to beat the Sentry?
I personally don't. I think that Sentry has enough physical strength and durability to go toe to toe with Thanos, but also that he has more hax abilities than Thanos. Sentry has more potent and destructive molecule manipulation, a stronger healing / immortality factor and he has a far higher energy output.
In the Incursion story Thanos and his Black Order crew were going from one Earth to another and using bombs from Reed Richards (I think) to destroy those Earths. A reader had asked Tom Brevoort if Thanos couldn't simply destroy the Earths under his own power and Brevoort told him to read the comic. Thanos can't destroy the Earth under his own power. He simply can't. Thanos fans on this board don't seem to like that, but that's the harsh reality. Sentry on the other hand has the needed, destructive energy output to destroy it.
Classic Fate & Classic Strange:
You can look at it both ways... Classic Fate and Classic Strange (although Classic Strange is still the current Strange, since there was never a retcon or something) had insane showings. They were fighting off truly cosmic threats. Given enough time to prepare for those.
But at the same time Sentry's story has him being an old character, who has always been around. Also as the Void. And Strange was never able to do something against the Void. Strange tried to use black magic on Sentry, but Sentry broke free and knocked Strange out, with Strange stating, that Sentry was always too powerful for that kind of magic.
So basically Classic / Current Strange was never capable of beating the Sentry / the Void, no matter how much time he had to prepare.
Classic Odin:
As you can probably assume it from my paragraph above... I think that Odin would beat the Sentry. Odin has supposedly affected galaxies in his fight. Sentry hasn't. Sentry's energies went far beyond planetary at the highest from what we've seen, but galaxies are still whole another level. Odin has the needed abilities to stop the Sentry, like stopping time, all the gimmicks with the magic and so on.
But here is the deal and ultimately that, what makes the Sentry so confusing... If it ever came down to a fight between Odin and Sentry, I would expect Odin to win. But if Sentry ended up winning the fight I wouldn't be surprised. If Sentry fought Galactus, I would expect Galactus to win. But if Sentry won, I wouldn't be surprised either.
Sentry has that ridiculous X-Factor, where no one knows what he truly is. Dark Avengers Molecule Man was still the Molecule Man from the old days and even if he was depowered, he still said, that he had never experienced something like Sentry's molecules. And Molecule Man has experienced multiverses. Yet nothing like the Sentry. If that's not crazy, then I don't know either.